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Sunday, August 19, 2012

Pets de Putain, de Nonne & Old Farts

Since mostly men wrote cookbooks of old, I assume the scandalous names of Pets de Putain [farts of a whore 17thC] or Pets de Nonne [farts of a Nun 18thC] can be chalked up to little boy humor, AKA old farts. They've even titled a lovely jacket or demi-robe as Pet-en-l'air [fart in the air]. Bad jokes aside, these tender and crusty pastries are a real treat.

Farts of whore.
Make your fritter paste stronger than usual [thicker than one would use for including items such as apples, vegetables, marrow, etc.], by the means of an increase in flour & eggs, then stretch [drop from a spoon or use a syringe] the dough [into] large or thin [pieces], & as soon as they will be cooked [deep-fried] serve hot with sugar, & water of scent [flower water–orange, violet, etc.].

5 comments:

I wonder if they called them that in la Nouvelle Orléans before they became known as beignets? Thank you for the culinary history. I love the concept of your blog, and the contents!Bonne journée,Colette

French food dictionary was then but these days help is on hand with a neat little pocket book called The A-Z of French Food - Dictionaire Gastronomique Francais-Anglais which comes highly recommended by Hub-UK.

Explore with me 18thC French cuisine as a habitante in Nouvelle France may have cooked. After the F&I War, and again after the Revolutionary War, habitantes were surrounded and overrun by Anglo and other American influences. By the end of the 18thC, new foods and new methods of cooking would change her culture forever.